Vivienne Westwood Shaved Off Her Fiery Red Hair

The famed designer said goodbye to her signature ginger locks in the name of the environment

Vivienne Westwood white hair
Vivienne Westwood white hair
(Image credit: Rex)

The famed designer said goodbye to her signature ginger locks in the name of the environment

Vivienne Westwood is known as much for her fiery red hair as she is for her gorgeous designs.

But the 72-year-old designer is now sporting a much different look.

Vivienne first cut off her hair and dyed it back to its natural white colour more than a week ago. Her new 'do was visible at her Paris Fashion Week show on 1 March. But because she covered it up with a feathered headdress, her makeover went widely unnoticed.

But now she's ready to show off her new look in all its glory - and explain the reasoning behind the change.

Vivienne Westwood white hair

Vivienne Westwood white hair
(Image credit: Corbis)

'Vivienne cut her hair as we must all wake up to Climate Change,' said a spokesperson for her fashion label told The Telegraph. 'And secondly she wanted to cut the red out for a while and have it white- to show she's proud of her age.'

Vivienne has long been an climate change campaigner. And it seems the environment may be the one thing she care about more than fashion. Last month she revealed she would not be expanding her fashion empire because she'd rather focus on backing Greenpeace's work to protect the Arctic.

Vivienne Westwood red hair

Vivienne Westwood red hair
(Image credit: Rex)

Back in September, Vivienne opened up to Marie Claire about her activism.

'It's really important to support things these days,' she said. 'Support anything. Because everything's connected, everything's mixed up, everything's a mess. And we have to save the world.'

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Ali Gray is an award-winning content director and digital strategist. Most recently she was the Director of Branded Content at Hearst, and helped to bridge the gap between the editorial and commercial worlds working across all Hearst brands, including ELLE, Cosmopolitan, Esquire and Harper's Bazaar. Prior to that she worked as an editor contributing to several brands such as The Telegraph, iVillage UK.